General Info

The B-25J-1 Mitchell is a Rank II medium bomber with a battle rating of 3.7 (AB/SB) and 4.0 (RB). It was introduced in Update 1.29.

The main purpose, usage and tactics recommendations

General play style

Simply put the B25 is the archetype of the medium bomber, it has versatile bombloads (4x 500lb or 3x 1,000lb which is enough to kill anything). It is faster then heavy bombers (can achieve over 340mph on dive to ground targets) and as a bonus has offensive armament that allows it to fulfill the role of an air superiority bomber. Defensive guns are provided in form of turrets & gunner stations. The B-25J is quite heavily armed in that regard with seven 12,7 M2 Brownings. In addition it is somewhat tough. If the aircraft sustains a direct hit to the fuel tank, there is a good chance of an explosion.

When flown properly, the B-25 Mitchell is among the best medium bombers in the game, with one of the most powerful defensive armaments at its tier. If you enjoy strafing ground targets with the B-25, then consider researching the PBJ-1H with 8 forward facing .50 cal M2 Browning machine guns and a 75mm cannon or the PBJ-1J sporting an impressive 12 forward facing M2 Browning machine guns, both of which are based on the B-25 and possess all the facets that make the B-25 Mitchell such a legendary aircraft.

Vehicle characteristics

Tactics

In realistic battles (and arcade to some extent), it is highly recommended to not exclusively bomb strategic bases and in general to not bomb from high altitudes. It was rarely used this way in combat, and it makes it very easy for enemy fighters to approach and attack you from your defenseless belly. In addition, the bomber's maximum payload of 3x1000lb of bombs is not enough to destroy an enemy base in RB, which is useless in regards to decreasing ticket count and, most importantly, does not help your team. Thus, leave base bombing to the British heavy bombers you will likely also encounter on your team, whose payloads vastly outclass yours, and instead - if you wish to help your team as much as possible - use your five nose-mounted Brownings on ground targets. This is not only infinitely more exciting than base bombing, it can also lower the enemy's ticket count drastically, therefore helping your team win. Fly at low altitudes and attack light pillboxes and soft targets with your guns. If you fail to destroy a target, then pitch up and use your turrets to finish it off. Save your bombs for targets your guns cannot kill, such as heavy tanks and heavy pillboxes; the bombsight is very helpful in doing this (something which the dedicated strafing variants such as the PBJ-1J lack). Make sure to use a fuse timer, 3 seconds should be enough when bombing at treetop level with 1000lb bombs.

When strafing, be sure to watch your radar at all times for any incoming enemies so you can adequately prepare for an attack. When being attacked, fly away from the assailant and try to get them on your tail, and manually open fire with your defensive guns, making sure to watch your tracers and adjust fire so they hit the target. Remember that turret guns will jam if fired for a long duration, requiring them to be reloaded, which usually takes almost twenty seconds, during which an attacker will most certainly kill you. If the reticule starts blinking, the guns are very close to jamming, so immediately stop firing and wait for the guns to cool down. Many experienced players will attempt to use utilize the deadzones on your belly and the arcs beyond your twin rudders in their attack. If you find an enemy doing this to you, then switch back to flight view and maneuver so that they are in the firing arcs of your guns again and try as much as possible to keep them out of your deadzones and, essentially, make their attack as difficult as possible. The attacker will then either eventually lose patience and will fly right into your guns, giving you an easy kill, or you'll get a lucky snipe on their aircraft. It is also very advantageous to use the keyboard controls for pitch, roll, and yaw in the gunner view as it will allow you to make small maneuvers while still concentrating on defending yourself, letting you, for example, dodge fire or roll/pitch/yaw and shoot someone in your deadzones. Also, use Universal belts for your turrets as they will do the most damage to enemies and cause devastating fires.

If you lose tail control for whatever reason, then immediately turn back to the airfield and use combat flaps to keep your nose up. Make a landing by alternating between takeoff and combat flaps and, if needed, landing flaps. Make sure that your speed does not go too low; if you start nosing down with takeoff flaps then do not use landing flaps (unless in an emergency) as you'll lose speed and potentially crash. Instead, engage WEP and wait for your nose to rise. There is no set method to doing this and it takes lots of practice, but making these daring landings is very rewarding. If you lose an engine, do not engage flaps as you will lose speed, end up in a stall and will die, simply fly straight and slowly make your way back to base, using WEP if needed. If using manual engine controls, close the radiator of the dead engine, feather it, and open the radiator of the working engine to allow you to use WEP all the way back to the airfield without overheating.

Please note this is still in the alpha stage and all the bugs in the data mining code have not been worked out yet. The data this was done on is not necessarily up to date.

Disclaimer:
Displayed information is under constant review. Game mechanics can and will change. The Wikipedia crew can not and does not guarantee up to date values.
Rating values are not a real-life representation of effects or damage and have been modified/simplified for viewer readability and satisfaction.

Weapon information:Rate of fire how many rounds per minute the weapon will fire on average, rate of fire has a max and min range
Maximum dispersion at 500m this represents the accuracy of the weapon at 500m and might not be correct depending on how the weapon is mounted in the plane
Time to high chance of jamming this represents the of a weapon jamming every round is greater then a threshold decided by wiki staff (around 10% chance per round)

Projectile properties:
'Mostly self-explanatory. The field's colour represents the ingame's tracer colour.Fuse sensitivity (This is a common source for "sparkles") is the threshold thickness required to set off an explosive charge. Average thicknesses are >1mm for duralumin, >0.1 for wood and >0.01 for canvas. The shell can pass through an aircraft without being set off, or only trigger after passing through the second layer and explode almost harmlessly outside the plane.

Physical projectile:Damage rating uses statistical maximum (removing outliers) of all weapons of caliber up to Mk103 Minengeschoss as 100 unit fixpoint.Fire rating also includes the projectile's penetration, it however does not include the ability of HE to cause fires. A fire rating of 0 does not mean it can not cause fires just means it's has the minimum chance.Optimal gives the range at which kinetic striking power is halved.

High explosive:Damage rating is the possible average damage (uses statistical maximum (removing outliers) of all weapons of caliber up to Mk103 for 100 unit fixpoint) over the maximum HE-radiusRadius. volumetric blast distance. Everything in the radius receives damage.

Fragmentation:Damage rating is representation of total combined damage weighed against the chance of a fragment to hit an object inside the radius (uses statistical maximum (removing outliers) of all weapons of caliber up to Mk103 for 100 unit fixpoint).Radius is the maximum travel range of the shrapnel fragments; Not everything in the radius receives damage, this can be because of luck or the fragment was stopped by something before it reached the target

M2/early Browning USA

Pros

More powerful than the .30cals.

High rate of fire, though lower than the .30cals.

Accurate.

Cons

Weaker than cannons

Like the .30cals, default belts usually contain ball ammunition.

Weapon information

Rate Of Fire ~ 750.00 rounds per minute

default gun

Maximum dispersion at 500m = 3.05m
Time to high chance of jamming = 13.70sec

bmg50 new gun

Maximum dispersion at 500m = 1.83m
Time to high chance of jamming = 14.70sec

Please note this is still in the alpha stage and all the bugs in the data mining code have not been worked out yet. The data this was done on is not necessarily up to date.

Disclaimer:
Displayed information is under constant review. Game mechanics can and will change. The Wikipedia crew can not and does not guarantee up to date values.
Rating values are not a real-life representation of effects or damage and have been modified/simplified for viewer readability and satisfaction.

Weapon information:Rate of fire how many rounds per minute the weapon will fire on average, rate of fire has a max and min range
Maximum dispersion at 500m this represents the accuracy of the weapon at 500m and might not be correct depending on how the weapon is mounted in the plane
Time to high chance of jamming this represents the of a weapon jamming every round is greater then a threshold decided by wiki staff (around 10% chance per round)

Projectile properties:
'Mostly self-explanatory. The field's colour represents the ingame's tracer colour.Fuse sensitivity (This is a common source for "sparkles") is the threshold thickness required to set off an explosive charge. Average thicknesses are >1mm for duralumin, >0.1 for wood and >0.01 for canvas. The shell can pass through an aircraft without being set off, or only trigger after passing through the second layer and explode almost harmlessly outside the plane.

Physical projectile:Damage rating uses statistical maximum (removing outliers) of all weapons of caliber up to Mk103 Minengeschoss as 100 unit fixpoint.Fire rating also includes the projectile's penetration, it however does not include the ability of HE to cause fires. A fire rating of 0 does not mean it can not cause fires just means it's has the minimum chance.Optimal gives the range at which kinetic striking power is halved.

High explosive:Damage rating is the possible average damage (uses statistical maximum (removing outliers) of all weapons of caliber up to Mk103 for 100 unit fixpoint) over the maximum HE-radiusRadius. volumetric blast distance. Everything in the radius receives damage.

Fragmentation:Damage rating is representation of total combined damage weighed against the chance of a fragment to hit an object inside the radius (uses statistical maximum (removing outliers) of all weapons of caliber up to Mk103 for 100 unit fixpoint).Radius is the maximum travel range of the shrapnel fragments; Not everything in the radius receives damage, this can be because of luck or the fragment was stopped by something before it reached the target

M2 Browning Turret

Pros

Cons

Weapon information

Rate Of Fire ~ 750.00 rounds per minute

default gun

Maximum dispersion at 500m = 5.93m
Time to high chance of jamming = 12.70sec

bmg50 turret new gun

Maximum dispersion at 500m = 2.00m
Time to high chance of jamming = 15.70sec